Many service departments such as in automobile dealerships rely on flat rates for particular services but also track the time required by service technicians to perform those services. The most widely used system for tracking those services and times is through use of daily time and operation ticket forms, such as illustrated in FIG. 1A, in conjunction with side printing time recorders. Throughout a day, a service technician enters by pen, for each repair job, his employee number (EMP.), a repair order number (R.O. NO.), and a flat rate time (OPER. TIME). The flat rate time may be designated by the auto manufacturer as an appropriate and expected time to perform the particular job. As the technician begins a job, he inserts the form into a side printing time recorder which records the on time along the right edge of the form. When the job is complete, he again inserts the form into the time recorder to record an off time. He then calculates the actual time required to perform the repair job by subtracting the on time from the off time.
The daily time and operation ticket form includes a base card which receives a carbon copy of the information input onto a front sheet. The front sheet is perforated to allow that portion dealing with each repair job to be torn from the form. The sheet is adhesive backed so that the flag ticket which is torn from the form can be applied to the repair order. The daily time and operation ticket form also permits the technician to complete flag tickets for W-time (nonproductive, nonrepair times). W-time codes are entered in place of the repair order number. The most often used W-codes are for the repair and cleaning of equipment, tools and facilities; waiting time; training and shop conferences; paid holiday and other paid absences; and paid and unpaid work shop rectification.
At the end of the day, total times, including separate totals for W-time, and paid W-time must be computed and entered at the end of the form as a daily report. Additional reports are generated periodically by the dealership. For example, FIG. 1B illustrates an efficiency and productivity report for a technician. The weekly totals from the totals of daily time records are inserted into the form; and percent efficiency, equal to the total flat time divided by total actual repair time, and the percent productivity, equal to the total actual repair time divided by the total available time, are computed.